


Black and Gold

by Kireii-yume (kireii_yume)



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Angst, Character Death, F/M, Feels, Funeral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-05
Updated: 2016-09-05
Packaged: 2018-08-13 03:29:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7960726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kireii_yume/pseuds/Kireii-yume
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Takumi loses someone very dear to him and learns how that which once brought happiness can turn into nothing but a bitter reminder.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Black and Gold

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all, this is my first fic on AO3! I usually write more fluffy stuff so this is NOT normal for me, but you know what, I felt like some angst. It's rated teen for more graphic description of blood, so if that bothers you you may want to skip this fic. Hope you enjoy!

Takumi still didn’t quite know how it happened.

It seemed like just one minute Oboro was choosing another outfit for him, coordinating his fashion just as she loved to do, with the most beautiful smile on her face. Takumi couldn’t get over that atypically soft smile—the way her light brown eyes just lit up and her cheeks dimpled ever so slightly on the sides. A gentle breeze was blowing through the open window, causing the occasional strand of hair to fall in front of Oboro’s eyes. By all means a perfectly tranquil scene, one Takumi wished could last forever. Her hands ran over his shoulders ever so gently as she helped him into an outer layer. Not really a necessary gesture, Takumi could certainly do it himself, but he had to admit that he loved the feeling of Oboro’s touch, especially since he could occasionally feel the brush of metal on his skin from the engagement ring that he’d given Oboro a short time ago. They wanted to marry as soon as possible, but royal weddings took time, and with Ryoma’s marriage in the planning stages, there wouldn’t be time for another ceremony in the near future. But in the meantime, just the knowledge that Oboro would be with him for life was more than enough to tide Takumi over. He loved her more than he ever thought he could love anyone. 

Oboro’s fingers danced along the elaborate clasps of the overcoat he wore seemingly effortlessly; she wasn’t even looking at them. Instead she was staring deep into his eyes, with a love and intensity that made Takumi start to blush. Chuckling gently (and musically, Takumi loved the sound of her laugh) to herself, Oboro finished the last clasp and gently placed her hands on his shoulders. “There you are, my lord,” she said with a wink. Ever since their relationship began and Takumi insisted that their stations were equal, Oboro had persisted in calling him “my lord” as a joke. At first he resisted, but he since grew to love it, just as he loved every part of Oboro. 

“It’s perfect,” Takumi told her, kissing her forehead gently. She laughed, rolling her eyes. 

“You haven’t even looked at it yet! How would you know?” 

“You designed it, of course it’s perfect. Why else would everyone in the castle have you to help them with their wardrobes?” Now it was Oboro’s turn to blush. Takumi smiled and caught his beloved’s soft, perfect lips in a gentle, chaste kiss. 

“You still need to look at it. I know you love me but you might not love my wardrobe choices,” she gently scolded after she’d broken off the kiss, resting her hands on his chest for a moment before pushing him toward the long mirror. Takumi fondly rolled his eyes.

“If you insist.” He looked in the mirror for a moment, intending to simply glance at it just to tease his future wife, but he quickly found his eyes drawn toward the perfect outfit Oboro had chosen. She’d dressed him in a long, striking black outer layer, similar to a happi but a touch more modern, a touch more refined, and gold trim seemed to spiral and snake around the neckline and sash. It brought out the gold in his light brown eyes, making a feature that he’d once considered blasé and boring stick out and become central. He’d insisted on something that wasn’t bright or overstated, and this certainly fit the bill, but in the past that had translated into boring. Now…it was anything but.

“You never fail to amaze me.” Takumi smiled.

“It's so, so subtle..." Here both Takumi and Oboro smirked, knowing that subtle described Takumi about as well as outgoing described Sakura. "...yet striking and intense. Just like someone else I know,” Oboro teased. She winked and kissed Takumi’s neck, once, twice, her hands slowly trailing up his back…

Suddenly she broke away. Her hands rested on his chest. “Lord Takumi. Move.” Something in her voice shook, barely noticeable.

“What’s wrong?” Takumi quickly looked around, but nothing seemed to have changed.

“Takumi! Move!” Yet Takumi stood there, frozen, trying to figure out what had overcome Oboro. With strength he didn’t know she had, Oboro shoved him away, causing him to stagger back into a doorway and smack his back against the shut door. But he didn’t even notice the pain; he was too busy focusing on the short gasp Oboro had let out as she fell to the ground. An arrow flew through the open window and pierced her stomach. Another pierced her neck. Finally one pierced her heart, and Takumi felt as sharp a pain in his chest as if it had been him. 

“SAKURA!” he screamed as he darted across the room, grabbed his bow from where it always rested next to his bed. “SAKURA! AZAMA! ANYONE, HELP!” His anguished yells seemed to fall on deaf ears as he nocked an arrow, yanked it back with shaking hands. Quickly, he glanced around and found the source of his the assault—a few figures crouching a hundred or so meters away. Takumi steeled himself and shot arrow after arrow at each. Even after he was sure they were dead, blind rage and mad anguish fueled him to empty his quiver into Oboro’s assailants. After he was finished, he yanked open the door. A single guard was rounding the corner, and Takumi rushed to him, tears starting to well up in his eyes. “Lady Oboro has been injured! Bring Sakura to this chamber! NOW!!” The guard ran off, looking simply terrified, almost as if he’d faint, and Takumi ran back to the chamber. 

“Oboro!” he gasped, kneeling down next to her. She didn’t respond. Her face was artificially relaxed, but it didn’t look serene or peaceful; it looked like she’d died with a grimace of pain marring her features. Her simple tunic was soaked in blood, so clotted and so plentiful that it looked more black than the typical bloodred. Blood bubbled in her throat, seeping out from where the arrow had pierced. Even her ever-present ponytail had its ends soaked in the blood that was quickly pooling on the floor around her. Takumi grabbed the shaft of one arrow, as close to the head as he could, but he suddenly remembered what Sakura told him—he should never take the arrow out of a wound without a healer present unless he knew that arrow was poisoned, since it would only serve to open the wound further. So he simply knelt there, gripping the hand of his beloved, willing what little warmth remained to stay there for as long as it could, fighting back the tears that were so ready to come. Oboro had insisted that she’d protect him with her life, but Takumi had never realized the gravity. He’d never thought it would come to this. Never…

Sakura rushed into the room, staff in hand, and Takumi frantically motioned her over. “Sakura…heal her…please…There has to be something we can do!” She knelt beside Oboro, but almost as quickly as she’d begun examining her, she’d stopped. “WHAT are you doing?!” Takumi cried, almost choking on his words as a small sob started to escape his throat.

“I’m s-s-sorry…” Sakura whispered, tears starting to run down her own cheeks. “She isn’t b-b-breathing anymore, and this arrow looks like it p-pierced her heart. Even if I sealed the wounds it wouldn’t w-w-work.” Her shoulders shook—Takumi guessed the shame was hurting her fairly badly. He rested a quiet hand on her back.

“If there’s nothing you can do, there’s nothing you can do,” Takumi murmured, grief taking his voice away. 

“Brother, I’m so, so…” Takumi motioned for her to stop, and Sakura fell silent, her lower lip still quivering as she watched Takumi attempt, in vain, to hold back tears. 

“Please…just leave me for a few moments.” Sakura left, shutting the door as quietly as possible, and Takumi finally broke down, sobbing so his tears melded with the blood that still seemed to be able to flow from Oboro’s wounds. 

In the daze of grief, Takumi still didn’t know how it had happened.

He was still trying to figure it out when a group of servants came to take her body. Takumi was numb and he barely noticed how her head lolled, so limply, contrasting so sharply from the bubbly energy that she used to have. He didn’t even register what was going on until one of the servants had to ask him to untangle his fingers from hers so they could leave, and after he did so, his hands had never felt so cold or so empty. And once the door closed, his room had never felt so austere, so stark, so void of life. Moments later when servants came in to clean the blood off the floor, he moved only so the perfect clothes that Oboro had dressed him in just moments before weren’t ruined  
He still hadn’t processed it when Ryoma, Corrin, Hinoka and Sakura came into his room an hour or so later, armed with a little consolation and as much familial love as they could possibly bring, but even his full family couldn’t take away the inexplicable emptiness he felt. They stayed and talked with him and he answered, but it all felt like they were talking from one of the Deeprealms, so far away yet somehow so close. 

Takumi still didn’t know the next day, when Corrin came in to gently suggest that he might want to change out of his day old clothes. He desperately refused, again and again, though Corrin kept fighting him. But she couldn’t understand that this was the last thing that Oboro touched, that he could still feel her hands resting on his chest through the fabric or the way she ever so gently brushed back the collar so she could kiss his neck, just the way she knew he loved. Corrin would never be able to understand that every time he looked at the fabric, he could hear Oboro’s words. “So, so subtle, yet striking and intense. Just like someone I know.” He could hear her gentle chuckle as she pulled the coat firmly around him, and he couldn’t take it off, because if he took it off that would all go away, it would leave him and it would never come back and the void in his heart would consume him. Corrin couldn’t understand that. But eventually his harsh words and vehement refusal hit home and she left, allowing Takumi to keep the clothes and the memories.

At her funeral, the day after that, Takumi was still trying to figure everything out. He still wore the clothes she’d chosen for him to mourn her, kept them on as he gave her eulogy, feeling numb as he forced his voice not to tremble because damn it, he would not appear weak in front of everyone, even in this moment. He quietly endured what felt like rubbing salt into every wound he’d ever sustained, talked through the sensation of having a lump in his throat that he couldn’t swallow. His eyes burnt from holding back the tears. All he knew was that it hurt, and he couldn’t deal with it. When he obediently filed by Oboro’s corpse, dressed in her best, with a beautiful high-necked kimono so no one would be able to see the remains of her wounds, Takumi couldn’t bear it. He left, the image of his beloved’s face, just barely in too much pain to look at peace, still burning in his mind. He ran to his rooms, slammed the door as hard as he could, because she couldn’t have died peacefully, it couldn’t have been painless, Takumi couldn’t stop remembering the way the blood in her throat bubbled with what he knew now were her last agonized breaths, her last attempt to keep fighting for life. He hadn’t been able to say goodbye, hadn’t been able to console her, hadn’t been able to take away her fear of death, because dammit, he was powerless, and he couldn’t deal with it. He fell to the ground, let out an anguished cry, tore at his hair, sobbed until his throat hurt and blinking felt like raking sandpaper over his eyes. Then, all was calm. Takumi stood. He took off his sash. Folded it. Took off his coat. Folded it. Changed into new clothes. Gently placed the ones Oboro had chosen in a drawer, one he’d never open again. Now, they made him sick to look at.

Because it now seemed too appropriate that Oboro had chosen to dress him in black.


End file.
